Modern Man - The Unknown Citizen (auden) :: essays research papers

The English-born American writer Wystan Hugh Auden was one of the most important poets of the 20th century. Educated at Oxford, he attracted attention as a prominent member of a group of young leftist writers who generally expressed a socialist viewpoint. The poem I have chosen for this essay is "The Unknown Citizen". I felt the time period reflected W.H. Auden's views, making the unknown citizen an example of the government's view of the perfect modern man in an overrated unrealistic society.In the time period that he wrote this poem in the late 1930's America was going through tremendous changes. This is the period in history in which The Great Depression was in effect. Most people living in the United States values, morals, and ethics were rapidly diminishing. The Great Depression fundamentally changed the relationship between the government and the people, who came to expect and accept a larger federal role in their lives and the economy. Throughout this time period Social Security was created.Back then this poem must have had a different meaning than today, it shows the value government has on issuing Social Security numbers. They make people believe it's for your own benefit when in reality they have the best use of it to track and retrieve information about your personal life. We see government as people we elected to represent our views they see us as a number. "Was he free? Was he happy? The question was absurd: Had anything been wrong we should certainly have heard (Auden 212)".I also felt he was expressing the fact that government makes it seem that everyone else is doing the "right thing" so you must follow him or her, and if you do so living a quality life will reward you. Their standards are so high that you will never reach the optimum point, so you work hard your whole life trying to improve. "His poems and essays present the idea of the good society as, at best, a possibility, never actually achieved, but which one must always work (Mendalson 112)". "Auden's poems speak instead in a voice almost unknown to English poetry science the eighteenth century: the voice of a citizen who knows the obligations of his citizenship (Mendalson 113).

Puritan Life

The expansion of literacy Influenced Puritans to become more involved in society, as most began to read the bible. As Christians, colonists of New England In the 17th century, felt compelled to be devoted to god In all possible manners; thus resulting In the formation of a tight knit community that was centered on the church.This united sense within the community spread, according to John Winthrop, It was the will of God; God had Intended for man to unite as one to better serve him, In order for them not to lose God's support Puritans must come together In all circumstances, be It miracle or tragedy. Puritans felt God had a Lana for their lives, that he had led them to the New world with great Intentions for them: feeling God had led them to the place they came to call home, Puritans sought out to discover the purpose God had brought them here.In doing so they developed a theory that God had determined they be bestowed with literacy, leaving illiterate ministries in the past (as note d in A Statement about Education in New England. 1643). The expansion of literacy influenced Puritans to become more involved in society, as most began to read the bible. As Christians, colonists of New England in the 1 7th century, felt compelled to be devoted to god in all possible manners; thus resulting in the formation of a tight knit community that was centered on the church.This united sense within the community spread, according to John Winthrop, it was the will of God; God had intended for man to unite as one to better serve him, in order for them not to lose God's support Puritans must come together in all circumstances, be it miracle or tragedy. Puritans felt God had a plan for their lives, hat he had led them to the New World with great intentions for them; feeling God had led them to the place they came to call home, Puritans sought out to discover the purpose God had brought them here.In doing so they developed a theory that God had determined they be bestowed with lit eracy, leaving illiterate ministries In the past (as noted in A Statement about Education in New England, 1643). The expansion of literacy influenced Puritans to become more Involved in society, as most began to read the bible. As Christians, colonists of New England In the 17th century, felt impelled to be devoted to god in all possible manners; thus resulting In the formation of a tight knit community that was centered on the church.This united sense within the community spread, according to John Winthrop, It was the will of God; God had Intended for man to unite as one to better serve him, In order for them not to lose God's support Puritans must come together In all circumstances, be It miracle or tragedy-puritans felt God had a plan for their lives, that he had led them to the New World with great Intentions for them; feeling God had led them to the place hey came to call home, Puritans sought out to discover the purpose God had brought them here.In doing so they developed a th eory that God had determined they be Statement about Education in New England, 1643). The expansion of literacy influenced Puritans to become more involved in society, as most began to read the bible. As Christians, colonists of New England in the 17th century, felt compelled to be devoted to god in all possible manners; thus resulting in the formation of a tight knit community that was centered on the church.This united sense within the immunity spread, according to John Winthrop, it was the will of God; God had intended for man to unite as one to better serve him, in order for them not to lose God's support Puritans must come together in all circumstances, be it miracle or tragedy. Puritans felt God had a plan for their lives, that he had led them to the New World with great intentions for them; feeling God had led them to the place they came to call home, Puritans sought out to discover the purpose God had brought bestowed with literacy, leaving illiterate ministries in the past (as noted in A tragedy.

What Is a Black Hole What Is the Event Horizon

Question: What is a Black Hole? What is a black hole? When do black holes form? Can scientists see a black hole? What is the event horizon of a black hole? Answer: A black hole is a theoretical entity predicted by the equations of general relativity. A black hole is formed when a star of sufficient mass undergoes gravitational collapse, with most or all of its mass compressed into a sufficiently small area of space, causing infinite spacetime curvature at that point (a singularity). Such a massive spacetime curvature allows nothing, not even light, to escape from the event horizon, or border. Black holes have never been directly observed, though predictions of their effects have matched observations. There exist a handful of alternate theories, such as Magnetospheric Eternally Collapsing Objects (MECOs), to explain these observations, most of which avoid the spacetime singularity at the center of the black hole, but the vast majority of physicists believe that the black hole explanation is the most likely physical representation of what is taking place. Black Holes Before Relativity In the 1700s, there were some who proposed that a supermassive object might draw light into it. Newtonian optics was a corpuscular theory of light, treating light as particles. John Michell published a paper in 1784 predicting that an object with a radius 500 times that of the sun (but the same density) would have an escape velocity of the speed of light at its surface, and thus be invisible. Interest in the theory died in the 1900s, however, as the wave theory of light took prominence. When rarely referenced in modern physics, these theoretical entities are referred to as dark stars to distinguish them from true black holes. Black Holes from Relativity Within months of Einsteins publication of general relativity in 1916, the physicist Karl Schwartzchild produced a solution to Einsteins equation for a spherical mass (called the Schwartzchild metric) ... with unexpected results. The term expressing the radius had a disturbing feature. It seemed that for a certain radius, the denominator of the term would become zero, which would cause the term to blow up mathematically. This radius, known as the Schwartzchild radius, rs, is defined as: rs 2 GM/ c 2 G is the gravitational constant, M is the mass, and c is the speed of light. Since Schwartzchilds work proved crucial to understanding black holes, it is an odd coincidence that the name Schwartzchild translates to black shield. Black Hole Properties An object whose entire mass M lies within rs is considered to be a black hole. Event horizon is the name given to rs, because from that radius the escape velocity from the black holes gravity is the speed of light. Black holes draw mass in through gravitational forces, but none of that mass can ever escape. A black hole is often explained in terms of an object or mass falling into it. Y Watches X Fall Into a Black HoleY observes idealized clocks on X slowing down, freezing in time when X hits rs Y observes light from X redshift, reaching infinity at rs (thus X becomes invisible - yet somehow we can still see their clocks. Isnt theoretical physics grand?)X perceives noticeable change, in theory, though once it crosses rs it is impossible for it to ever escape from the gravity of the black hole. (Even light cannot escape the event horizon.) Development of Black Hole Theory In the 1920s, physicists Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar deduced that any star more massive than 1.44 solar masses (the Chadrasekhar limit) must collapse under general relativity. Physicist Arthur Eddington believed some property would prevent the collapse. Both were right, in their own way. Robert Oppenheimer predicted in 1939 that a supermassive star could collapse, thus forming a frozen star in nature, rather than just in mathematics. The collapse would seem to slow down, actually freezing in time at the point it crosses rs. The light from the star would experience a heavy redshift at rs. Unfortunately, many physicists considered this to only be a feature of the highly symmetrical nature of the Schwartzchild metric, believing that in nature such a collapse would not actually take place due to asymmetries. It wasnt until 1967 - nearly 50 years after the discovery of rs - that physicists Stephen Hawking and Roger Penrose showed that not only were black holes a direct result of general relativity, but also that there was no way of halting such a collapse. The discovery of pulsars supported this theory and, shortly thereafter, physicist John Wheeler coined the term black hole for the phenomenon in a December 29, 1967 lecture. Subsequent work has included the discovery of Hawking radiation, in which black holes can emit radiation. Black Hole Speculation Black holes are a field that draws theorists and experimenters who want a challenge. Today there is almost universal agreement that black holes exist, though their exact nature is still in question. Some believe that the material that falls into black holes may reappear somewhere else in the universe, as in the case of a wormhole. One significant addition to the theory of black holes is that of Hawking radiation, developed by British physicist Stephen Hawking in 1974.